Please Keep Me in Your Prayers

By David J. Stewart | March 2011

I thank God for the opportunity to do the work He has given me to do. This is an honor and a privilege to serve the Lord and help others. I have never considered my ministry a burden, and never will. It is really the Lord's ministry and I always am reminded of that. This is God's work, which the Holy Spirit has put into my heart to do. Philippines 2:13, “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.”

Albeit, I am suffering physically in much pain lately, and that's why I've slowed up a bit in writing articles. I'm not going anywhere by God's grace. I'm just taking life a day at a time, as God gives it. I'm just overwhelmed lately with the nerve damage, puffy arms, neck pain, muscle tension, and arms and legs feeling like they're partially asleep. I sincerely ask for your prayers, especially that God will continue to bless this ministry, and help me to cope with my ongoing health ailments. I get overwhelmed if I think about the future, thinking that I'll have to live with this the rest of my life; but it helps if I just focus on the moment and today only. I think about Proverb 27:1, because we don't know what a day may bring forth.

I've had much pain in my right arm, extending over the shoulder into my arm and thumb. The pain is equally as bad running over my right knee down into my toe. It hurts bad at times. I've tried to take the drug Lyrica, but it adversely reacts with the Oxycontin.

I've lost 35 lbs. of weight over the past 3-months, eating apples and oatmeal quite a bit. I've gone from 207 lbs. in December of 2010 down to 172 lbs now in March of 2011. I was hoping it might help reduce my pain, but it has done the opposite, causing increased sharp razorblade-like cutting pain in my limbs.

I cannot put into words the suffering I've been through, and continue to endure. I have the oft feeling that everything is wrong in life, and yet I know that all is well in my heavenly Father's house. I can relate to Abram in the Bible, who felt the shadow of horror over his soul. Genesis 15:12, “And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him.” I awake often, feeling sharp pain running down my legs. Lately my entire right arm goes numb while sleeping so that I cannot lay on my right side at all. I cannot sleep without 10 mg. of Ambien daily. The medication is a blessing for me.

I take 120 mg. of Oxycontin daily to endure the pain. It takes the edge off, but doesn't take away the horrible aching, dull, agonizing, constant pain where the bone is located in back of my neck. I've had this every single day since March of 2004 without relief. I am not complaining; I'm just hurting very much. The pain never goes away. I live alone and probably will for the rest of my life due to the horrible pain.

I recently went to renew my driver's license and the gentleman saw that I was having difficulty smiling for the photo. He kept asking me if I wanted to redo it and I said yes, because I wanted a smiling picture on my license. He was a great guy. I explained to him that I have a damaged spinal cord in my neck. My facial nerves were hurting much that morning, and I felt like someone was sawing across the bone in my neck. People cannot see damaged nerves, muscle tension, and radiating pain in my limbs. People often mistake me for being upset or serious, but I'm just in horrible neck pain. It has ruined my life to say the least.

My arms feel like air bags, with debilitating toothache-like pain in my neck which radiates into my facial area. I have razorblade-like pain radiating down into my arms and legs, especially over the right shoulder and knee, into the thumb and toe. I have tried to get medical help, but no medical procedure has so far helped. I've been through 2 major ACDF neck surgeries without a single family member by my side nor waiting at home. On both occasions I hoped not to wake up from surgery, praying for the Lord to take me home. Neither surgery has helped. In fact, the 2nd surgery in April of 2010 has made me much worse, intensifying the tingling, pain, and puffiness in my limbs.

The insurance company didn't want me to get surgery and deliberately abused me the month prior to surgery. They bad mouthed me to the doctor and they were trying to get rid of me. The nurse was mean and ran a star-wheel device that tests nerve reflexes into my leg shin. I counted 27 holes in my leg that were bleeding. I had flown thousands of miles and it was this or nothing. I was in too much pain to refuse surgery. They abused me horrible and God knows what they did to me. I have filed numerous complaints, standing up for my rights; but the system is rigged, inefficient, and will blackball you, making your life worse than death. Filing a complaint with the Medical Board in California is a waste of time. I can only cry out to God for Him to help and avenge me. People just don't care nowadays. Everybody does their individual job in a big out-of-control system that afflicts people. The system has taken on a life of it's own, and it's cruel and brutal.

When I awoke from the 2nd surgery, I felt horrible pain in my neck and the tight plastic brace around my neck. Tears were running down the side of my head in the recovery room. I said to the nurse, “I am very lonely.” She replied, “I've never heard that one before” and she walked out of the room leaving me alone. I prayed to God and thought about Matthew 28:20... “I am with thee alway, even unto the end of the world.” People can be so cruel and heartless. But God saw me through all that.

I could write a book of the abuse I have suffered at the hands of the medical industry, insurance companies, and government agencies. I'm just

I ask for your earnest prayers for this ministry and me daily. This ministry is much bigger than me, it's about the Lord Jesus Christ, Who is THE WAY, THE TRUTH, and THE LIFE (John 14:6)! HEAR YE HIM!

“Even so, come, Lord Jesus” (Revelation 22:20).

I love you all in the Lord, whoever you may be!